The Bluebird of Happiness
by Andoku
Summary: While walking along the seashore, Lion begins to wonder about whether the pursuit of happiness has a meaning or not. Fortunately enough, Will is there to listen.  WillxLion   Spoiler Ep8


**Note**: In this story Lion is **a girl**.

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><p>"<em>Let's go somewhere else"<em>

The first time Will had made that suggestion to Lion, above the howling of the storm they had found themselves swallowed into for the sixth day in a row, the young Ushiromiya had simply thought he was suggesting moving on to another fragment. That search of a happy ending they had started under Lambdadelta's protection, days after days spent wandering around the endless sea of fragments in the attempt to find a happy one, up to that moment had actually been just a non-stop jumping from one dimension to another one.

That was why Lion had no reason to suppose that his suggestion was actually hinting to something completely different from what expected. She had no reason at all to suppose that, after being strongly grabbed by the wrist, she would have been taken to a magnificent park inside a villa, whose flower beds were cut and shaped as to build a labyrinth of flowers.

That visit to the park became the first of their daily detours around the world. Every time the cold hand of that tragedy that was chaining the whole Ushiromiya family to a heinous massacre was about to tight itself around Lion's heart, every time the number of their failures was about to get really close to a double-digit number during a single day, Will had taken the habit of abruptly dropping their task. He grabbed Lion by her wrist, dragged her with him by paying no mind at all to her questions or requests and lead her somewhere else, far from Rokkenjima, both in time and space.

At first, Lion had buckled under and had followed him along in that stroll he had stubbornly wanted to take at all costs, just because his answer had been a curt grumble about him needing to get away from the rain and the damp feeling of Rokkenjima's storm. However, as days went by, as their destinations started to change every day, Lion too started to take a look around and let herself get caught up in his long strolls. Even just to forget the anguish that only a few minutes before was howling into her ears alongside the stormy winds.

That night was no exception. Breathing into a warm and salty breeze, Lion gazed at the almost indistinguishable embrace of a pitch black sea and a night sky marked by a slim crescent moon. High above her head, the flickering of the stars reflected on the quiet water like its surface was a mirror, creating the illusion that the sky had decided on a whim to turn upside down.

"It's the first time we take a detour to the sea…"

Lion lowered her eyes to her bare foot plunged into the sand, now turned cold because of the disappearance of the sun's warmth. She smiled at the slow slopping of the waves, rhythmically brushing her skin as a tepid caress. Right next to her, with his hands plunged deeply inside the pockets of his long coat, Will just shrugged. His golden eyes didn't move for a single moment from the thin and bright coastline that was stretching just a bit forward on the right side into the black sea by drawing an arch in the dark.

"It's just the first time the idea of taking a detour to the sea has popped up in my mind."

Not bothering to check if Lion was going to follow him or rather going to stay where she was, looking at her own feet sank into the water, Will slowly made his way along the seashore, his own boots left behind and plunged into the sand. For a few seconds, Lion thought about asking him if it would have been really wise to leave behind their shoes without anyone to look after them. But in the end, guessing he would just dismiss her fears by telling her not to think about it too deeply, she decided to simply run after him.

Lion walked behind Will with her hands crossed behind her back, throwing the thought of walking side by side with him in the back of her mind, fearing that doing so could have suggested way more than she would have ever wanted to let on about her own feelings. Absentmindedly, she looked down at her feet once again. And right in that moment, her eyes caught sight, among the retiring waves, of a small and flat white thing.

A shell, that had shone just for an instant thanks to the pale moonlight.

Of all the places they had visited during their daily detours up to that day, Lion realized she had never brought back any tangible memories of what she had seen. And that was why, watching that small and light shell that had suddenly jumped into her sight, she felt the urge to pick it up and bring it back with her. However, the exact moment she bent down by moving her right feet a little forward on the instable sand grains, the subsiding sea dragged away part of her foothold. And her right feet sank into the sand, making her lose balance.

The sound of the splash of water that welcomed her legs suddenly bending down, mixed with the surprised yelp that escaped her mouth, proved to be way more explanatory than anything else to Will, who had been stopped by the sound of her voice, of what could have happened.

"Care to explain how in the world did you manage to fall down on a beach that has no rocks, with a completely still sea?"

"Don't look at me like that! The sand withdrew and I lost balance…"

Pouting in a quite childlike way, sittin down on the sand as the water of the sea kept on submerging her feet and soaking her clothes, Lion glared back to Will's downcast glance. However, pretending not to have seen the outraged way she had tightened her lips and had looked up at him, Will just bent toward her to grab her left hand and then easily dragged her back to her feet.

"Watch your feet."

"T-There's no need for you to tell me that! I'm not a child!"

Lion tried to make her words sound enraged and frustrated by the way he was talking to her. However, her words slipped out from her lips like some kind of trembling sentence completely deprived of any strength. All , without the shade of a doubt, because of the way Will had one-sidedly decided to hold her hand, entwining their fingers and leaving her no choice but to follow him once again in his leisured and silent stroll along the seaside.

"Will, you can let go of my hand now…"

"So that you can fall back on your butt once again?"

"I won't fa…!"

Once again, for the SECOND time, her feet missed the foothold in the sand, tripping on a small pit a wave had just engraved while retreating towards the sea. However, this time, Will stopped immediately, turned around, rose up their joined hands and prevented her from falling down again.

"So said the one who was about to trip again."

The temptation to reject or to punish with a pinch on his butt that keen sentence he had addressed to her with such an eloquent grin, proved to be very hard to fight against. However, since she had been the one to confute her own words with her own actions, there were very few reasons, apart from her hurt pride, that could have justified some kind of violent reaction. So, the only thing Lion had left to do was glaring at him and turning away her head toward the sea with a scornful movement, following him once again in their stroll. And giving up also on the matter of the embarrassing and intimate way he was holding her hand, only because she knew that, were she to fall once again, he would have acted right on the spot to keep her on her feet.

In the same way he had kept on doing from the moment he had made her run away from the theatre's seat Bernakastel had chained her to, supporting her every time she was about to give up and encouraging her to keep on going in their search for a happy fragment.

A happy fragment that, however, seemed to be nowhere to find.

How many weeks had they already spent wandering around the wide and endless sea of fragments scoring nothing but failures? How many days had they already spent doing nothing but stumble across the same heartbreaking tragedy? As much as she would have liked not to lose heart and was more than willing to strive on, sometimes, a weak voice did rise up inside her mind. Whispering in her ears an incredibly unnerving and distressing question...

"… Will…" Lion called out to him, her eyes fixed on her steps on the sand "… what if this fragment we're searching for doesn't exist at all? What if it's nothing but another form of the Bluebird of Happiness?"

"Are you talking about Maeterlinck's play "The Blue Bird"?"

The Blue Bird. The story of Mytyl and Tyltyl, two siblings supported by the fairy Berylune in their attempt to find the Bluebird of happiness, whose magic could cure their ill mother. A fairy tale she had watched as a cartoon on TV many years before, at the end of which the Blue Bird the main characters had searched for during their long quest, ended up being just a common bird, in no way different from all the other ones. To prove that the incarnation of happiness they had chased actually never existed.

"What if we're searching for something that doesn't exist? What if we're wandering around the sea of fragments chasing something that never was in the first place?"

"It was the Bluebird as some kind of magical animal that didn't exist, not the concept it embodied. The "Bluebird of Happiness" as in "happiness itself" existed, just not with the form they presumed it had."

Now that Will mentioned it, Lion did remember that despite the bitter surprise of finding out the magical creature called "The Bluenird of Happiness" didn't exist, at the end of the tale the siblings managed to realize that the happiness the bird embodied was still obtainable, although in a different way from what they had originally presumed. So, as Will had said, the "Bluebird" actually existed, but not in the form the two main characters expected it to have.

Could it also be, then, that the fragment they were searching for did exist somewhere but that it had such a shape, such a color, to make it hard to recognize?

"The "Bluebird" has always been with them, even way before they decided to leave their house. However, they didn't realize it." Will went on, still not glancing around his back and keeping on walking.

"How come they didn't realize that, despite it having a different form, what they were searching for was already standing so close to them?"

"That's up to interpretation. Perhaps because they were so persuaded the "Bluebird" was outside their own house that they didn't realize it was standing right next to them. Or maybe because they didn't have the necessary qualifications to recognize it, since the "Blue Bird", beside happiness, also embodies much more metaphysical concepts like finding one's own path, being blessed with luck, overcoming difficulties. And then also…"

"Also…?"

"Love."

Whether Will decided to suddenly stop and turn around toward her just to emphasize his own words or for a completely different reason, Lion would have never been able to guess by just hopelessly trying to read behind his golden eyes. However, the combination of him turning around saying THAT single word and the way he slightly pulled their joined hands toward himself, was enough to chain her feet in the sand.

"However, I kinda guess the last concept is due to Madame D'Aulnoy's fairy tale, rather than to Maeterlinck's play."

"There's another fairy tale linked to the "Bluebird"?"

"Actually, they're two completely unrelated works. However, they both feature a blue bird." Will explained "In Madame D'Aulnoy's one, the blue bird is actually Prince Charming, turned by your usual evil step-mother into a bird. Despite being cursed, the prince devote himself to support his beloved princess, who was locked up inside a tower, by bringing her valuable gifts."

"Oh, I didn't know about this one…"

A "Bluebird" the search of whom around the world turns out to be completely deceptive, that right from the start has always been close by and that at the same time is also a prince willed to help his lover, although being changed in its body by a charm. Painted out like that, that mental mash up of all the features of the evanescing and mysterious figure of the Bluebird looked like something totally unreal and clearly improbable. But still, the most important thing was that, despite the fact that its form could even look absurd and thus not easily recognizable, "the Bluebird of Happiness" did exist.

"But in the end, the "Bluebird" really existed, right…?"

"Yeah. And that's why next time I hear you questioning its existence I'll pinch your butt! Don't give up, you must believe that one day you'll find it"

In order to find it, she would probably have to travel a lot, to take a look at every existing fragment. But one day, surely, she would find her own happiness, her own happy ending.

That was why she had to keep on going, without giving up.

"I'll stay with you until you'll find it, even if it would take us thousands of years." He smiled at her "And besides, it's not like I've something better to do, now that I'm retired. My future as a shell hunter can wait a little longer."

"… Shell… hunter?"

"Even shells have their own charm."

Shrugging and then smiling at the sound of the brief laugh she gave him, Will tightened his grip on her hand and turned around to resume their slow walk along the seaside. Lion followed him, this time without any complaint, looking up at his tall figure walking in front of her.

That figure of him who had supported her during all the difficulties she had to face, who had remained by her side during their long travel around the sea of fragments and who had encouraged her to shape her destiny with her own hands.

His tall, reassuring and reliable figure, dressed in a long _blue_ coat…


End file.
